ORIGIN

Extraordinary Variety: Bonhams in Paris on Thursday

Bonhams hosts a lot of interesting auctions, but their upcoming Les Grandes Marques Du Monde Au Grand Palais scheduled for later this week in Paris is one of the most impressive thus far. Featuring plenty of high dollar vintage exotica like Bugattis, Voisons, Lagondas, Delages, Astons, and Ferraris, the full catalog is definitely worth a look through if only for fun. Here are a few of our favorites, two blue chips and two quirky but cool realistically attainable machines. Find the full listing here, all of which is scheduled to cross th block on February 6th, 2014 in Paris, France.

Starting the list is this clean, solid, and complete looking 1953 Saab 92B De Luxe, lot 349 (chassis 06941). It’s said to have been in storage for the past 20+ years and as a result is currently non-running, but if it’s anywhere near as nice as it appears to be in photos that shouldn’t present much of a problem—provided you can still find parts of course. We really like the clean lines of these early, two cylinder, two stroke cars, and would love to see this one back on the road belching blue smoke all over the place.

Following the slow little Saab is this very fast 1989 Porsche 962C, lot 396 (chassis 962-006BM). Its race history includes runs at the Nurburgring, Spa-Francorchamps, and more, the most impressive finish of which was 4th overall at Spa in September of 1989. After crashing during practice at that year’s final round of the World Sports Prototype Championship it was put into storage, and in 1998 began a two year long restoration using the original tooling to repair the chassis. A Dyno run showed 672 HP @ 8,000 RPM in January of 2012, and the car has competed in several vintage events since completion.

Lot 391 is this amazing 1964 Citroen DS19 Concorde Coupe (chassis 4272001) with custom coupe bodywork by Henri Chapron. Chapron built several bespoke, DS-based cars, and though all were interesting few were as handsome as this model—Decapotable convertible excluded of course. Only 38 of this particular model are said to have been built, and this one looks great following a 2011 restoration. It’s said to be in excellent condition, and was displayed at the Milano Auto Classica two years ago.

Rounding off our selections is this 1988 Mazda 323 Familia GTX Group N rally car, listed under lot 354 (chassis JMZ BF 831200285960). Driven by Pascal Gaban for Mazda Rally Belgium this particular car carried him to the cup in the 1988 FIA Driver’s Championship for production-based models. Other career highlights include a class wins in Greece and Ivory Coast as well as 2nd overall at the latter. It’s been kept in as-last-raced condition, and though it looks to be in good condition is currently non-op due toa defective fuel pump. The race livery, auxiliary lights, and stage ready stance are great, and ideally it will be hitting the gravel again soon following mechanical sorting.

34 Comments

It is just an impression, but after reviewing all the lots with the prices paid for those that sold, it seems to me that the sale rate was relatively low and that the prices are not as high as I would have expected. Could the chaos in financial markets have caused buyers to be more cautious? Might be completely wrong, as the only market I have been following closely lately is that for E-types (and the E-types here seem cheap).

I work for Bonhams, just got around to this thread now…sorry for the delay

@Jim Rosenthal

For future reference, you can always download a catalog before the auction by clicking on the link the right sidebar that says ‘Download a catalog PDF’. Alternatively, you may cycle through the lots with a bit greater speed by scrolling to the bottom, clicking ‘100’ for the number of lots displayed, and then navigating that way. Most car auctions have 200-400 lots (including motorcars and automobilia).

@Varjak

Bonhams publishes all of its results live, as the auction is happening. As soon as the hammer falls, the final sale price, including premium, is published online. As such, you can see the results on the site right now.

During the actual auction, you can watch live by clicking the link at the top of the page in the left sidebar labeled ‘Follow the auction live’. This link is of course no longer there.

This is the essence of the hobby isn´t it? Lots of things you´ve always wanted but have rarely seen.

I don´t quite understand why quirky Chapron Citroëns make so much money, when you could buy the factory station wagon and be even stranger……But that´s the essence of France, do it just because, do it your way, do it well. Or not and call it art.

Am a total victim for DB, CD or any small French coupé, but how chic is that Saab? If there is a prototype of the modern small car, it´s the Saab 92-6. The only thing they got wrong was the future of 2 strokes, even if it made sense at the time.

@ jim rosenthal : click on “auctions” and then on “Les Grandes Marques du Monde au Grand Palais” You’ll see all the items for sale with a search function. I don’t think that you can download the catalog, you can buy it though : “catalog” at the page bottom on the left.

I wouldn’t know about the Swedish market for these, but in the rest of Europe, the market for Saab 96s seems to have split in two: good ones between €10k and €15k, and rusty annual safety test failures for between €500 and €3k.

That’s an improvement over the long, long period when even good ones didn’t make much money, which meant that many enthusiasts send their cars to the crusher once the inevitable rust got structural. Fixing that seems to take real time and skill on these Saabs, and almost none of the costs could ever be recouped. That seems to be slowly changing now, but only because so many died.

If you have any pointers to cheap, good Saab 96s or 95s, and particularly about how to prevent them from rusting, I’d be really interested (I think between some Germanic interpolation and Google translate, I’ll be able to cope with Swedish)

Could someone post on how to actually get to the auction catalog and see all the items for sale? I could not figure out which item to click on to see a lot of what’s mentioned in this thread, but I’d like to….

Ok, you want a nice Saab 92, 93, 96 or 95 in good restored and running condition? You want a car with correct detailing, color, interior, everything. Go to Sweden. Pay 40-50 % less. Don´t make a fool of yourself at an auctionhouse.

Come here and you´ll meet a loving Saab owner over a cup of coffee, or fika, and you´ll get the stories, the memories and feelings included in the deal.

On the other hand its somehow nice that Saab cars get a little more recognition in the international auction world. But that “home made” 93 – please …

WOW! Great assortment. Some spectacular motorcycles! For example: Lot 208-The Majestic w/the Bernardet side car, what an amazing machine. How the ‘inventor’ came up w/this in 1929 is beyond me…styling & mechanicals…amazing! Next to this beauty—any of the MV Agustas!

How on earth can anyone use the word ‘handsome’ in a sentence containing reference to that Citroen? Some neat stuff in the catalog ; like Mr RDH, i found all sorts of automobilia that I sincerely and severely need. Cant believe some of the estimate prices tho! wow… definitely not for very modest budgets.

Besides the usual variety of cars and bikes provided by Bonhams, there’s excellent automobilia available for more modest budgets. Signage, emblems, a terrific array of radiator mascots and fine art. I love the “Ascari at Monaco” poster, wonderful graphic representation of his rescue from the harbor. I’ve never seen that one before. Wouldn’t mind one of the luggage items, either.

My two fantasy purchase choices based purely on uniqueness… one bike, one car:

Besides the usual variety of cars and bikes provided by Bonhams, there’s excellent automobilia available for more modest budgets. Signage, emblems, a terrific array of radiator mascots and fine art. I love the “Ascari at Monaco” poster, wonderful graphic representation of his rescue from the harbor. I’ve never seen that one before. Wouldn’t mind one of the luggage items, either.

My two fantasy purchase choices based purely on uniqueness… one bike, one car: